Your eyes a shade of greenish brown,
Beauty in my view,
Bags beneath your sleepy eyes,
The worlds not been kind to you.

Your skin so fare and porcelain smooth,
Fragile but standing strong,
You force yourself into my thoughts,
Haunting my all life long.

You sit and you smoke your cancer,
Ashes to the line,
You float away with one last smile,
I swear you were my sign.

I'm trying not to shop till I drop,
                                                     Help
                                                          
                                                            
                                                                      Me !!!!!!!

she was wearing soft red lips
and blue eyes as deep as the ocean
and a shirt that read “THIS WILL DESTROY YOU”
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
too late
too late
and you were already moving, already in motion
she made her darkness shine like gold.    

she was wrapped in silk and satin
that would have burned you if you tried to touch
and she was sitting by a window
waiting for you.
she wanted to keep her sadness close
and her vastness open.
she didn’t understand what it meant to be the moon
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
and you were already moving.
she was a wolf, she said
and her knowledge could eat you
alive.
you, on the other hand
have always been a deer.

                        she spoke with a voice of lush and luxury
and wore her jacket over her shoulders
on the first day of spring.
her enigma was thrilling
and she scared you
almost to death
but not enough to make you leave.
she had hands of ice
and the breath of heartbreak.
she still remembered how to laugh
however cynical.
she was just as lost and dismembered as anyone else
but knew how to hide it
among sharpened knives
and glasses of red wine.
she loved the thought of drowning
but yearned to be saved
and asked you for help.
she let you in
but she was a self-proclaimed goddess
with secrets deeper
than your lungs.
she was water
and you have always been air
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
and you were already moving.
the whole time you moved within one word
and that word carried you to places she never could:
chance.
she tried to warn you
she knew she couldn’t be the person you loved
yet somehow you still did
somehow you still did
(she) did still you, somehow
somehow you still did.
it was already too late
late too, already, was it?
it was already too late.
before you even met her
before you even saw her turn around in that coffee shop
before her smile
before her accent reached your ears
before your arms touched
before she read her writing to you
before she opened
before she placed her hand on your back
before you watched her walk away down the dark city street for the first and last time
before you met the body behind the screen, you did
you loved the words.

This is the place where people come to forget that they will die one day.

They let their conscience build up on the linoleum floor in puddles,
deep and dark
And follow the crowd to the next store
And the next
And the next.

This place will bleed you.
It will tear your pockets out of your clothing
And your children’s hands from yours.

A new shirt.
A new TV.
Well done.
You’ve done well.

But when you leave the white walls
The music tinny and dim
Escalators and litter
You still won’t feel free.

In little coffeeshops
By the back corner, far from the exits
But near the little hall leading to the bathroom
At a time set by a large window
The poet, his soul filled with words and reasons to say them
But unsure how to convey them
Can observe the nerves and synapses
Converging in this single axis
The windowside throne, the great looking glass
Provides a view of every soul to pass

Through the door to the core of any good café
The front register
Where they serve the junkies
Their first no cream no sugar fix of the day
The register ******* this sunrise shift stands tall and wears
A pleasant smile
Like a suit of armor
For the fractures frayed and loosened pieces
Of her 65 hours a week between two jobs psyche

From his back corner vantage point
The poet sees this early morning warrior
And watches her adversaries approach
The sleep deprived and the caffeine dependent
The men in suits with leather briefcases
Hustling and bustling through self inflicted exhaustion
Work force revenants who begin to shamble through the door
Out of the early morning mists at about 5:30
just as the world is shrugging of the shroud of night

In his seat of power, the poet, lord of the room
Can see, despite the dim lights of the coffeeshop
These early birds, gaunt and hungry like vultures
Standing shoulder to shoulder with the last of the night owls
Shabby old things with ruffled feathers
Too tired to sleep or simply without a roost.
Their re rimmed eyes provide a window
Through which a sovereign of the word
May glance upon their tired souls

Yes from that lovely back corner
The poet is a king, a lord in noble regality
Reshaping reality
Sitting in the back of any coffee shop
In Phoenix Arizona
In America
In the world
In this whole great evergrowing span of universe
And turning people into words.

Normally this place is colder than a penguin's ****
But Holy Satan, it's steaming right now
And I'm sure it's not my cappuccino
Or the fact that i'm wearing a hoodie,
Must be (it is) the movement of your buttocks
Over there on the little wooden stage
That nobody uses except for sitting and
playing with those lame monster cards.
You and your friend, yeah, that one.
The girl that was on the table behind mine,
sneaking a peek at my iPad as it streamed
The Twilight Zone, the episode with the piano
That reveals what people hide in their souls
(****, lucky that isn't here or
They'd call the cops on me for
Like ****** assault or something),
Began twerking randomly when you called her
And are still going at it, as if you're telling her lessons,
And i'm sitting here pretending to be paying attention
To Rod Serling's monologue intro
When really i'm looking at that popping shake.
Holy Satan! "Control yourself" I think
"Oh what's that? I don't remember
Having a highlighter marker in my pants.
Oh ****, that's not it, ******* it."
And now you're showing your friend
How to seductively move that stomach,
This is bad (no, it's perfect),
You pulling your shirt up a bit
Above the belly button and doing that.
And how come i'm the only one here
Noticing this (besides your friends at the table).
I know the place is mostly empty but
It's a small space, it's easy to see this,
Yet these idiots are drooling over their
New Pokemon game; what the ******* hell?
When you've got the greatest show on campus
Going on right ******* there! I don't get it.
Am I like a perv or something? (Yes).
To the girl with the goddess body
Twerking all nerdishly and awesome
In the coffee shop:
Don't stop,
******* it.
Holy Satan,
Don't ever stop!

walk into the tobacco shop,
the bell rings, letting everybody
know you're here to buy a cigar
that will soothe your pain
and eventually make it disappear,
until it comes back and
you'll reach out for
another, and another,
until your pack is empty,
and you'll go to
the same shop to buy
another one.
*it's a cycle that never
ends, and i hope it never will.